Page 112 - Psychoceramics and the Test of Fire

Arbor Vitae Cortex

preparations intended to solve problems for which he also had the
pseudoscientific explanation. I studied that list as if it were the rap
sheet on a suspect I wanted to arrest before he committed his next
crime. How had Al Magnus been beguiled by this humbug artist?
From obscure origins, Betzaroff first made an imprint upon the
questing community with Iatrotropin, “The Pomaceous Panacea in
One Daily Dose.” Based, so he claimed, on an ancient Central Asian
all-purpose remedy for the ills of mankind, he recklessly advertised
his home-brewed product in several naturopathic journals. Within
weeks it was roundly denounced by snookered purchasers as “a lot of
applesauce.” He barely avoided legal action—but was back soon with
Alexandrogen, a mysterious mock-hormone guaranteed to turn any
milquetoast into a commanding captain of industry or infantry. This
potion, in turn, was exposed as a capsule of capsicum with potential
to induce extreme dyspepsia.
By then he was having difficulty finding outlets to promote his
products, even among the most disreputable and desperate devotees
of orphaned and outlawed cures. Still he persevered, pushing uphill
against a headwind of disapprobation and ridicule. Next he did a bit
more advance research to bolster his declarations of efficacy: human
beings, despite a few centuries of ever-increasing subtlety of
investigation by physiologists, geneticists and biochemists, still had a
few secrets to reveal to those unblinkered by orthodoxy, according to
the Gospel of Betzaroff. And who was to contradict him or his ilk?
Inspired amateurs were making great discoveries all the time, weren’t
they? The maverick scientist, a beloved character in American
folklore, exerted a powerful pull on the easily magnetized population
of semi-literate seekers and sufferers strewn across the purple
mountains and amber fields of grain. He might as well put “martyr”
at the head of his resume.
After a two-year hiatus from the alternative medical scene (during
which he clerked in a video-rental shop) he returned with a startling
announcement: contrary to received anatomical wisdom, Homo
sapiens possessed a vomeronasal organ, almost vestigial to be sure,
but capable of activation nonetheless. First observed in the feline and
equine behavior dubbed “flehmen,” higher organisms had evolved
the ability to receive extremely subtle scents, including pheromones
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